Actually within perhaps 20 minutes from the time they had stepped from their
planes they had closed in on the pillbox after overcoming protecting land mines and
silencing snipers...Highly dangerous work, even in the training scheme, starts when the
heavy barbed-wire entanglements have to be demolished. Two paratroopers crawl slowly,
pushing a Bangalore torpedo that looked like a big rocket on a long pipe, wriggling close
to the ground, they inch it forward into the thickest section of the wire, under covering
fire from comrades they withdraw quickly.

Seconds later there is a roaring blast. The barbed wire has disappeared. The
sharp explosions of the torpedoes destroying the wire around the pillbox end. The hand
grenades hurtle in. Under well-placed protection two or three men of a special demolition
detail among the paratroopers appear from nowhere and creep like cats to the pillbox...The
charge is set and dark figures move quickly across the shaded part of the clearing, taking
advantage of deep grass, small bushes - even shadows - to place distance between
themselves and the pillbox. Within a few seconds the explosion occurs.

By March of 1943 Canada had its elite Battalion.

While the Canadian parachutists completed their
training in the United States, discussions were underway in England about the employment
of this new unit. The Battalion would be part of the Canadian element in the United
Kingdom, but under command and equipped as a British parachute battalion in the 6th
Airborne Division.

Some of the possible roles for which the 1st Canada Parachute Battalion was
trained for included: seizing ground which dominated a bridgehead and holding it until the
next formation arrived, delaying the movement of enemy reserves located inside, or outside
the original bridgehead and to operate with direct-cooperation with seaborne assault
divisions.

Training run without equipment at Bulford, Lt GH Macdonald
is leading.